


willing

by sunshine_captain



Series: Sentiment [1]
Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pon Farr, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 03:23:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9365795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshine_captain/pseuds/sunshine_captain
Summary: Deep in space, far away fromanything, Spock goes into pon farr for the second time.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This started when I decided I wanted to see if I could write an unrequited K/S fic. I can't actually conceive of any universe where Jim and Spock aren't incredibly, equally in love, so I don't actually think this could have happened with them, but it was interesting to write. And once I started I really couldn't stop. (There might be a followup to this, and if there is, it's...not going to be happy.)
> 
> Also, my friend who read this said it made her cry, so take that as you will. :P

Deep in space, far away from _anything_ , Spock goes into pon farr for the second time.

He collapses in the middle of the bridge and is taken away by medical personnel. Jim gives over command to Uhura immediately and hurries anxiously to sickbay.

McCoy is looking as concerned as Jim feels, standing over Spock's biobed and scanning him with a grim expression.

“Bones, what's wrong with him?”

“Jim, every reading I'm getting is telling me he's going into pon farr again.”

Jim stands beside the bed and stares down at Spock. He's so still. It's scary. “He didn't collapse like this last time.”

“No. That's different. And it seems that the whole thing is accelerating far faster than last time. I don't have a clue why.”

“Do we have time to get to Vulcan?” Before he's finished asking the question, Jim knows the answer. They're too far away. It would take them almost a week at maximum warp to get there, and from McCoy's expression, they don't have that much time. Spock couldn't last that long .

“So he has to...mate with someone,” Jim says slowly, staring down at Spock's face. “Why is this pon farr different? Coming on so unexpectedly and so quickly?”

“It's that damned hybrid nature of his,” Bones growls. His grumpy tone can't hide the concern he's clearly displaying in his expression. “It apparently does more than just make my job a living hell when I have to operate on him. From everything I've managed to find out from M'Benga, and pry out of Spock himself, ordinary Vulcans typically have very regular pon farrs that operate on a cycle of five to seven years. Sometimes more or less, but that's typical, and a Vulcan can, after their first pon farr, time their next one down almost to the day, get prepared in advance when they know it's coming. Our First Officer, however, has that human half interfering with it all.”

This is bad, but Jim still thinks it's solvable. They can find a solution, and Spock will be okay. “We're too far from Vulcan to find Spock another Vulcan, but if he just needs to have sex....” Jim pauses, mind racing. Spock would never be okay with sleeping with someone below him in rank. He would consider it unethical. And he wouldn't want someone to be told that if they don't have sex with him, he'd die. Too close to coercion. 

The answer is obvious to Jim. He'll help Spock through it. There's no one closer to Spock than he is, he's a _higher_ rank than Spock so there's no concern about ethics or coercion, and maybe Spock will find it easier to cope with afterwards if it's Jim seeing him through it. There's no shame in being seen in that state when Jim has seen him like that before.

“I am afraid it will not be that simple, Jim.” Spock's voice is raspy, but he's awake, and trying to push himself up. McCoy barks at him to lay down and starts scanning him again. 

McCoy had moved Spock into a private room, presumably when he'd noticed Spock was in pon farr, so Jim hopes Spock will talk to them about this. “What do you mean? You just need physical release, right? It has to do with mating drives and probably a little about ensuring the continuation of your race.”

“It does, but the physical needs are a secondary priority. The most important component of Vulcan relationships and life has always been the mental connections and bonds we form among our family and those we are intimate with.”

“Your lovers.”

“Yes.” Spock doesn't so much as twitch when McCoy jabs him with a hypo. “Our bondmates. My first pon farr was an....aberration. The ceasing of pon farr without any kind of mental connections was extremely unusual. Though this one has come on unexpectedly, I have no reason to believe it will be any different from the norm. I will require extensive mental contact with whoever would be my...companion throughout. They could not merely copulate with me; I would need to bond with them. It is the formation of the bond, and not the physical sensations, that ends the mating fever.”

So Spock will have to bond with whoever helps him through it? “You'd probably want to keep your bondmate close at hand so that the pon farrs after this one will be easier to get through. I plan to serve with you for a long time to come, Spock. And even after we retire, I can't imagine I'd be far away from you. You're one of my best friends. It works out perfectly.”

McCoy drops his scanner, and Spock's eyebrows fly up, and that's when Jim realizes that he hasn't said anything out loud yet about his intention to help Spock.

Why are they so shocked? Did they think he'd sit back and let Spock die a slow and agonizing death? Being bonded to Spock, it sounds nice, actually. Every time they meld, he wishes it lasted longer than it did. A permanent connection between them, well. He's not averse to it. 

And the sex? Jim has had sex with men before. And with friends. He's never thought of Spock that way, but he's not an unattractive man. It wouldn't exactly be torture.

“Jim, what in the hell are you doing, do you even know what you're signing up for,” Bones explodes.

“No, Jim,” Spock says, softly. “I could never ask that of you.”

“You're not asking it of me, Spock. I'm volunteering. I'm as close to you as I can be to someone, and I would never let you die if I could stop it. I'm going to do this.”

“I cannot allow it. It would not be right. Not when you do it as a friend, and I....were I to allow it, it would be selfish and dishonest of me.”

“Spock? What do you mean?” Jim comes closer to Spock and touches his shoulder.

In the background, McCoy looks from one man to the other and then quietly slips out of the room, realizing this is a moment he doesn't need to be a part of.

“My regard for you....” Spock stops and closes his eyes for a moment. “Is not the same as yours for myself. Jim, I am....I feel.... You are t'hy'la to me.”

He's never heard Spock sound this way before. The word Spock uses for him is clearly Vulcan, but Jim doesn't need a translation. The _way_ he says it is enough for him to understand.

It's enough of a shock that Jim has to sit down in the chair beside the biobed.

Spock, sitting up by this time, doesn't meet his eyes. “Now that you understand why I cannot allow it, I will be returning to my quarters. I request that you don't try to override the locking mechanism.”

Jim gets over his surprise at once when he realizes that Spock intends to lock himself away and die alone and in agony. He grabs Spock's wrist to keep him from standing. “This doesn't change anything, Spock. Do you really think that knowing that you love me will change my opinion of you enough I'd let you die?”

The slightest tremor goes through Spock's body at Jim's voicing the truth aloud so easily. Were he not entering pon farr, he most likely never would have allowed that much to show.

“This changes _nothing._ I'm going to get you through this, and we'll be bonded.” Jim extends two fingers and slides them down Spock's wrist, over his palm, and meets his index and middle finger with them. “I'm okay with that, and I need you to be, too, because I won't let you suffer.”

Spock breaks, gives in, and Jim sees it happen. He curls his fingers around Jim's and holds his hand there, in his own. He's trembling again. He wouldn't have noticed if their hands weren't pressed together.

“I no longer have the strength to resist you, Jim. You erode my self control. My mental shields....” 

Spock rubs their fingers together, eyes falling shut, and Jim knows it's time to leave sickbay and go to Spock's quarters (the temperature there will be more comfortable for Spock), be alone so no one else sees Spock so open and vulnerable.

He orders the corridors between sickbay and Spock's quarters cleared. Spock goes willingly along when Jim guides him out into the corridor. He seems dazed, and won't let go of Jim's hand.

By the time they reach their destination, Jim has realized that Spock was only so coherent in sickbay because he was exerting all his mental and physical control to keep the influence of pon farr at bay, to try and dissuade Jim from helping him. 

Jim remembers when Spock emerged from the plaktow to plead with T'Pau not to make him fight Jim, after T'Pau had said he would no longer be coherent. The knowledge of the depth of Spock's feelings for him gives Jim a new perspective on how it must have hurt Spock, how painful for him it must have been knowing he'd likely kill the one he loved, how intense the pain must have been to have enabled him to surface from the blood fever.

“No more,” Jim promises Spock softly. “Let yourself go, Spock. I'm here. You don't have to fight against it anymore.”

Spock's hand travels unerringly up towards the meld points on Jim's face, but he doesn't initiate the meld or draw Jim closer. A tortured groan escapes him. “No.” He's still fighting it, trying not to let it happen. He doesn't want to do this to Jim, to them, and Jim understands his reluctance, but he can't let it go on any longer.

Jim presses himself to Spock, takes one hand and laces their fingers together, and puts his other over the one on his face. “Do it, Spock.”

He projects his willingness, his love for Spock, his readiness for the meld as strongly as he can, hoping it reaches Spock.

It does. All at once, Jim feels Spock's mind in his, but it's not like their previous melds. Spock is far more unrestrained this time, his emotions let loose, and distantly, Jim feels his physical body, his heart speeding up when he _feels_ how intensely Spock loves him. How much he needs him. How much he wants him. In return, Jim lets Spock experience firsthand his willingness and affection, how ready he is to go through this with Spock.

Jim opens himself to Spock, and Spock lets himself go, entwines his mind with Jim, embraces everything that Jim is. Jim lets it happen, urges Spock on, and finds he enjoys the closeness of Spock's mind to his, the sense of it becoming something more permanent, as much as he expected he would. Maybe even a little more.

For Spock. For Spock he'd do everything, this and more, willingly and with a smile.


End file.
